A Divine Tale Read online

  A Divine Tale

  by: Jonathan Antony Strickland

  Throughout the ages, mortals have delighted in telling one another tales, with each tale being different and charming in it's own right. Tales ranging from epic adventures across lands and seas uncharted by mankind, unexplored alien worlds with cunning and deadly inhabitants that can appear friendly and harmless but may secretly seek the delight and taste of human flesh. To the more simplistic tales that may or may not involve everyday streets and houses being used as a backdrop to their settings. Tales involving quick thinking minds, deadly schemes and cunning, with twists and turns where beggar can become king and fool can turn to wiseman.

  These are but a few examples of the flexibility and change from yarn to yarn, but mostly there is one thing that they will probably share in common. And that is a moral!

  Surprisingly Gods, on the other hand, differ from mortals, believing that their superior minds hold the answers to all questions and that a tale told is nothing but a story, with any meaning and lesson that is meant to be learned in its telling to them a complete waste of time.

  So a tale told amongst Gods is a very rare thing indeed. However the tale of Seglaman the snow God is meant not just as a lesson, but as a warning as well. And the reason it is remembered and told is to remind any up and coming young God who has been assigned a new (run-of-the-mill) world to rule over, whom just might get itchy feet, or even simply become jealous that some of the older more experienced Gods are worshipped on more than the one world. If this is the case then the tale should serve as a solid reminder, and with a bit of luck the God will hopefully not make the same mistake as Seglaman.

  The Sorry Tale of the Snow God Seglaman

  The perfectly flat plain of white frozen tundra flowed for mile after mile, covered in a thick cold sea of purest soft snow. Occasionally vegetation peeped through adding dots of colour to the blinding white landscape that could set a mortal brain whirling from its harshness.

  After surveying his surroundings the ice God Seglaman breathed a frosty sigh of relief. It felt good to stand once more on the world he had left behind in search of others.

  For the last four thousand years he had travelled to seven other worlds. Worlds without Gods, that you'd think would surely crave a deity such as he. Planets that where hostile and heathen in culture, ferocious and ignorant in thought and creation. Planets that had lacked the beauty and the belief that the Gods power could so easily provide.

  True, the beauty that Seglaman would bring would be a biased beauty. With massive ice storms and permanent snowfall, ferocious winter beasts that would help keep the population in check and dispose of any who rebelled against Seligman’s laws.

  In return though, Seglaman like all good Gods, would give them gifts and food. In his case an unlimited supply of fish would swim in the frozen seas and lakes. Rabbits and seals would provide his people meat and specially selected vegetables (mainly sprouts, winter carrots and winter cabbage) would litter the lands all around.

  But on each planet Seglaman was limited. For unlike the planet Seglaman had been given to rule over, these planets he now sought to conquer, were not ice planets like his beloved Mazzzula, these planets where only partially frozen, or frozen in different places at different times of the worlds year.

  Although this did not limit Seglaman's mystical powers it did limit the places he and his twenty four thousand snow warriors could travel too. And in the places that Seglaman could not reach, people would still live. These people would ignore Seglaman’s reign, instead preferring to live off lands unfrozen where children could be raised under the imagery of false gods, thus allowing minds to grow and technology to develop. And as Seglaman and his twenty four thousand snow warriors were unable to travel to the warmer climes of these planets he was completely unable to lift one gigantic snow fist to prevent the inevitable from happening.

  Through time, these disruptive humans would get cleverer, and as technology progressed and the imaginary Gods became more divine in the minds of the unholy, war would eventually be called upon Seglaman.

  These mortals that worshipped the lies of false Gods could be beaten back to their lands, only for them to return years (sometimes centuries) later, equipped with better weapons and better strategies for defeating Seglaman, his mighty snow warriors and the people who gave him worship. And although an eight foot high snow warrior is immune to practically all barbaric weaponry, evolution through time would always create new weapons, weapons that the barbarians could use to defeat the Gods mighty army with. And Seglaman would have no other choice but to flee the world and leave the mortals (who where unable to fly to other planets like the God and his snow warriors) and try once more on a new world to convert its people to the worship of a true God.

  But history had an uncanny habit of repeating itself and a new planet had to be sought out as the snow God continued in vain on his holiest of quests. Until eventually Seglaman's powers began to wane and he had no other choice but to fly back to his beloved Mazzzula were he could rest, recharge his powers, and mend the ego that had been dashed by seven consecutive worlds.

  To Seglaman, Mazzzula hadn't changed one little bit. Looking across the snow covered plain he could just about spot the great city of Mooog. He gave a great icy sigh of relief as he set out in this direction, his crystalline heart beating joyously cold within him.

  On his way, Seglaman rebuilt some of the snow warriors that he'd lost on the other worlds. Indeed on the very last world (a particularly nasty and godless planet called earth) the slaughter of his flock had been so great he'd been reduced to a mere thirty six snow warriors. However, by the time he'd got within spitting* distance of Mooog (*This being still some distance as Seglaman's frost spit was a remarkable thing indeed, resembling a two foot long icicle that could travel similar distances to a spear thrown by the strong arm of a soldier from the eleven tribes of Lokuuupfol (a Lokuuupfol soldier being renowned for the distances achieved in their spear-chucking exploits)(Though it would be much more accurate and deadly.) he'd rebuilt twelve more of his white monstrosities.

  The city had changed little in the four thousand years he had been away. If anything it was a little smaller than what he'd remembered, and the houses were now built with rock instead of snow. This though was but minor detail and Seglaman was pleased when he noticed a crowd gathering at the cities borders, watching as he and his warriors approached. He noticed the crude snow statues that stood in many of the Mooogarian gardens and he cried great snowflakes at the thought that after so many generations the people had not forgotten their God.

  The snow God was however wrong! The people of Mooog did not remember him at all, and in their hands they held weapons to greet Seglaman with. And before Seglaman had time to announce his long awaited return, the people of Mooog attacked.

  Mainly they fought with primitive weapons such as axes or clubs, but some of the populace carried a more advanced weapon, a weapon he had encountered before. It had also come into existence on the seven planets he had sought to rule over, being used ineffectively against him and his snow warriors on many an occasion. On each of the seven worlds it bore a name and each name he knew well.

  On the world of Klop it was called a "Zagnifop", on the world of Miminch it was a "phut-phut", on the world of Gawiuj a "kneegok", a "rols" on the world of Fangralon, on the world called earth it was called a "gun", on the world of Josofogohorotowoso a "-o-o", and finally on the world of !@#$%^&* a "**2*".

  On seeing the weapon Seglaman became afraid. He knew that if such a weapon had been created then surly too the other weapon, the weapon that had become Seglaman's very nemesis had evolved as well. But then Seglaman remembered that he stood against the citizens of Mooog. Greatest of the cities, mightiest in the
world of Mazzzula. If the might of Mooog did not possess such a weapon to fight him with then there was no doubt whatsoever that such a weapon had not been created at all. And as Seglaman watched the people of Mooog as they harmlessly hacked, pounded, and slashed at him and his snow warriors, he grew mad!

  And madness turned to white cold rage as he realised the snow sculptures he'd at first perceived to be in his honour had been defiled with obscene vegetables and dirty black rocks. He wrongly assumed that these had been made as an insult to him. Wrongly thought they had been made by malicious and ungrateful hands, instead of by the